« KELO takes a church | Main | Get it right... »
January 18, 2006
Hostel Takeover
Mollie at Get Religion has a post about the incredibly gruesome film Hostel, comparing the hew and cry by some cultural conservatives against Brokeback Mountain and the silence regarding this film.
Hostel was #1 its first weekend of release, but fell pretty far this weekend, ousted by decidedly calmer films like Hoodwinked and Glory Road ( Go here for all of your box office needs)
Mollie has a point. The argument has been made that Brokeback Mountain has been objected to because it's a grenade in the culture wars (which is, according to some who have seen it, including Victor Morton and Rod Dreher, a questionable assertion, however). And films like Hostel are not? There's nothing new in gruesomeness - this is a trend that's been growing over the past 25 years or so, not only in film, but in gaming as well. Not a problem? I wonder.
In the comments on the GR post, Peter Chattaway says that since Hostel seems to be falling fast, despite its big opening, it won't have much of an impact. What he doesn't account for is DVD life of films like this. Take it from the mother of young adults and a pre-teen, it's there that these movies take on new life.
For example, my daughter reports that a favorite movie of many of her classmates, and one that "everyone" has seen (a doubtful proposition, but I'll grant her that a lot of them have) is Saw - described in the link. Rated R, gruesome, explicit, vengeful. It's not just that a lot of them have seen it. It's that it's a favorite in the age group. Which, I might remind you, is 8th grade.
Once a movie gets to video, ratings, except for the NC-17, are useless (because places like Blockbuster won't stock them with that rating). Not every video store clerk checks ID, clueless parents rent whatever the kids shoves at them, kids whose parents might be more attentive can go over to other kids' houses, older siblings can get it, and no one checks ID at Netflix.
Viewing violence, even extreme violence, in the midst of a non-exploitive drama that has an actual narrative, theme and some artistry is not problematic. That's not what we're talking about. It's this gruesome hacking and pornographic gore that permeates these kinds of film as well as many video games that should give us pause - and most of all, a reason to be attentive. If we didn't need one before.
Posted by Amy Welborn | Permalink
TrackBack
TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://www.typepad.com/services/trackback/6a00d83451be0d69e200d8345b38ad69e2
Listed below are links to weblogs that reference Hostel Takeover:
» Consistency when protesting movies from Bettnet.com Musings of Domenico Bettinelli
Amy Welborn makes a good point about how we react toward movies based on their (perceived) role in the culture wars. In contrast to the hew and cry over Brokeback Mountain, we have heard little or nothing about the amazingly gruesome &qu... [Read More]
Tracked on Jan 18, 2006 4:24:40 PM
Comments
Hostel and Brokeback Mountain is an apples/oranges comparison. One was a holiday release, clearly an Oscar contender, with big stars and big buzz. The other was a January release (translation: garbage), no stars, and despite Quentin Tarantino's name in the advertising, clearly something the studio was, if not embarrassed by, definitely not a contender for anything other than Roger Ebert's outrage.
Sorry, doesn't work.
Posted by: Nance at Jan 18, 2006 1:46:36 PM
Hostel has made 36 Million in 11 days whereas Brokeback Mountain has made 32 Million in 39 days. Hostel works better than Brokeback Mountain at the boxoffice.
Posted by: Tim F. at Jan 18, 2006 1:58:14 PM
I find the whole fascination among suburban kids (say, ages 8-14) with gore and violence in movies and video games an interesting phenomenon. I think that much of it just falls away in later teen years as sex and dating becomes the dominant obsession of their young minds.
I also think that much of it has to do with the extreme sheltered existence of suburban kids. How many of them have the chance to watch (up close) or participate in the slaughter and butchering of a large mammal (cow, adult swine), or even several fowl or fish? Death does not exist in suburbia, aside from the occasional road kill, or a mouse brought home by the family cat. Death is exotic in suburbia, and thus fascinating.
Posted by: Old Zhou at Jan 18, 2006 2:01:23 PM
i'm with old zhou. but i would argue that kids anywhere can be just as sheltered... even in the country.
so, do i have to gear myself to watch a "slasher" film with my son to take away the "forbidden fruit" element?
what's a mom and dad
to do
wise old zhou?
Posted by: Brigid at Jan 18, 2006 2:20:58 PM
May I raise my hand as one cultural conservative who objected to Hostel?
Posted by: Maclin Horton at Jan 18, 2006 2:21:30 PM
Brokeback Mountain pushes my outrage button while Hostel does not because BM introduces something new (to me at least): the homosexual love story, seriously portrayed. My contribution to the culture war amounts to feeble efforts at containment and hunkering down in my bunker with the kids. The forces of death already occupy the ground of violence, gore and pornography and there's no chance of displacing them.
By the way, after watching Ang Lee's acceptance speech at the Golden Globes and reading his comments afterwards, I'm convinced Rod Dreher and Victor Morton are dead wrong about BM's not being a volley in the culture war.
Posted by: adjuration at Jan 18, 2006 2:22:30 PM
Maybe films like Hostel are not thought of a grenade in the culture wars because of the genre. There seems to be much more latitude for horror films.
BTW--I loved Saw. It has one of the best endings ever in the history of movies! I wouldn't say it's completely devoid of artistry, although I certainly wouldn't let kids/young teens watch it either.
Posted by: Sue T. at Jan 18, 2006 2:23:24 PM
Dear Brigid,
Grab your rifle and your kids,
and go bag yourself a deer or boar or whatever.
String it up on a ladder, and let the kids clean and dress the meat.
Let them feel the blood run out,
and the slippery stink of the guts.
(leave the rest for vultures, etc.
They will be grateful.
Maybe take a tail, ear or eyeball for a souvenier--boys love this.)
Wrap the meat in newspaper, put it in the Igloo in the back of your SUV, and take it home.
Let them cook it.
Explain to them that this is what happens behind all those nice hamburgers at McDonalds, behind the Kentucky Fried Chicken, behind all the nice, neat, plastic wrapped packages at the supermarket meat section.
Posted by: Old Zhou at Jan 18, 2006 2:27:45 PM
Uh... excuse me, but it's a MOVIE!!! Not real life, not a way of life, but entertainment. If it offends you don't go see it.
Posted by: Sheldon Buck at Jan 18, 2006 2:46:09 PM
Sue's comment regarding genres is interesting. Maybe for a few reasons. First, many conservative critics would view violent horror films as so obviously repulsive as to be unworthy of comment. Second, despite the box office (and DVD) popularity of the market, the dominant culture is deeply offended by violence. So maybe conservative critics focus the fight on films embraced by the dominant culture (e.g., films the favorably treat deviant sexuality, euthanasia, and abortion). But there might be third more interesting reason. Some conservative critics (E. Michael Jones and Thomas Hibbs) recognize in some films within the genre conservative elements. Like a recongition of the failure of the Enlightenment to conquer original sin. The enemy of my enemy and what not. Not that Hostel is a good example of this, judging from Hibbs' recent review. No doubt, in the post-Limbo era the popularity of horror films will plummet.
Posted by: Loudon is a Fool at Jan 18, 2006 2:50:46 PM
eeewwww
can i not
just hire
a gun
to do it
at one of those
"summer camps"
or pawn him off
on the boy scouts?
Posted by: Brigid at Jan 18, 2006 2:52:30 PM
Sheldon:
Your naivete is quaint.
Posted by: Mark Shea at Jan 18, 2006 2:54:15 PM
This problem is nothing new. I remember Bob Dole trying to jump on the "cultural conservative" bandwagon in 1996, during the course of which he listed one of Schwarzenegger's movies (True Lies) as family viewing. Somebody tallied up the body count in this movie and it is quite appalling. But this is the United States, where sexual sins are considered the worst offenses against the moral order, and anything involving violence is excused. Make no mistake: the culture of violence (and the associated cheapening of the value of human life) is the number one moral problem in this country. I'm sure conservatives are not applauding Hostel, but neither does it provoke the outrage that Brokeback Mountain does. For the record, I think Brokeback Mountain is the best movie of the year.
Posted by: Tony A at Jan 18, 2006 2:58:05 PM
Oh please, Tony. Saddle up to the water cooler and make polite conversation about your collection of vintage Playboys and you MAY get one or two questioning looks. But brag about the fight you got into last weekend and you'll quickly find yourself eating lunch alone. There may be a fascination with violence among Americans, but it's hardly accepted or excused.
Posted by: Loudon is a Fool at Jan 18, 2006 3:06:30 PM
In line with the last comment,
Tell you coworkers that you took your teenage son to see "Brokeback Mountain," and you'll be the toast of the office.
Tell them you took him to a boxing match, and you'll be viewed as Neanderthal Man.
Posted by: Old Zhou at Jan 18, 2006 3:09:44 PM
Hostel may not be the movie to pick on here.
Unlike many horror movies it has a point larger than "always look behind you".
The movie clearly makes the link between the use of people as objects and pornography and prostitution.
Spoilers below: BE WARNED
In the movie the protaganists spend the first half of the movie doing boorish things. They try to have sex with anything that has two legs. When their friend can't get any, they hire a prostitute. But that only sets up the second half of the movie where they are tricked into going to Eastern Europe where they are kidnapped and sold to buyers who kill and torture the protaganists as they see fit.
In the scenes of torture they cut back to guards watching hardcore porn. Clearly artistically pointing out that torturing and killing a person is the end result of treating someone as an object and that pornography and prostitution treat people as objects.
It's hard for me to slam a movie that is probably the most anti-porn movie i've seen in the past five years. And I also learned that I clearly don't have the stomach to torture someone to death. So there's that too.
Posted by: Tom Buller at Jan 18, 2006 3:19:09 PM
The director and writer of Hostel is Eli Raphael Roth. From his bio at IMDb:
...
Paid for his student films by working as an on-line sex operator for Penthouse Magazine, back when only doctors and scientists were on the internet. Subscribers paid $30 an hour to have sex with Roth and his N.Y.U. friends, thinking they were gorgeous Penthouse models. Roth claims that these experiences inspire many of the characters he writes today.Quentin Tarantino calls him "the future of horror," and praised his work in the May 2004 issue of Premiere Magazine.
Is a huge fan of Mary-Kate Olsen and Ashley Olsen. While filming Cabin Fever (2002), Roth played the Olsen Twins's film Holiday in the Sun (2001) (V) on a continuous loop in a screening room, to give the cast and crew "artistic inspiration."
When he worked as a production assistant for Howard Stern on the set of Private Parts (1997), he worked the late shift from about 11pm to 7am. During this time he spent rewriting and reworking the Cabin Fever (2002) script because he says it was "problematic" at best.
...
His father Dr. Sheldon Roth is a world renowned psychiatrist/psychoanalyst and a professor at the Harvard University medical school. His mother Cora Roth is a painter who shows her work at the O.K. Harris gallery in New York City.Was originally approached to be the voice of the computer trivia game "You Don't Know Jack," but turned it down to write Cabin Fever (2002).
Spends every summer at Mohonk Mountain House in New Paltz, New York. Roth claims that the beautiful old hotel, built in 1869, is a continued source of inspiration for scary ideas. Other guests of the mountain house include Roth's favorite writer Stephen King.
Posted by: Old Zhou at Jan 18, 2006 3:50:55 PM
Don't you people know when you're beaten? Mr. Buck's scathing brilliance should shame us all into silence.
Posted by: Maclin Horton at Jan 18, 2006 3:59:47 PM
Well, filming horror movies must pay, coz' the Mohonk Mountain House in the summer is some $500 a night.
And no mention of violence today - in the form of teens beating on, and killing homeless people?
Posted by: tk at Jan 18, 2006 4:01:41 PM
I think working as an "online sex operator" would give you tremendous insight into the inner workings of a porn addicts mind. And how the addicts mind doesn't treat the "operator" as a person but as an object to get himself off.
So I don't doubt that his experience led him to make this film and these characters. The protaganists in this film might have been modeled off of customers of his.
As for the rest of bio. I'm not sure how it's appropriate. It shows he's weird and eccentric. Alot of directors are.
Posted by: Tom Buller at Jan 18, 2006 4:03:05 PM
Dear Tom Buller,
I don't think it is directors that are "weird and eccentric."
The writers are the whackos.
Posted by: Old Zhou at Jan 18, 2006 4:07:34 PM
The difference in moral indignation between slasher films and gay romance is easy. No one is selling chainsaw dismemberment as "The Holy Spirit saying something new for the Church."
Granted, several churches support abortion, but we won't get into that here.
I do think, though, that 'Hostel' will get a less smarmy review by the USCCB film reviewer than 'Brokeback' did, if that's any gauge of moral outrage.
I'm still waiting for 'Into Great Silence' to hit DVD.
Posted by: St. Jimbob of the Apokalypse at Jan 18, 2006 4:10:00 PM
I should make it clear. This movie is not suitable for children or adolescents.
And viewers can ignore the anti-porn theme throughout the movie and be left with a film that shows a lot of sex and a lot of violence.
I recall watching the movie "Kids" in college with some other guys in the dorm. I watched in horror as the other guys cheered when one of the main characters killed a homeless guy that bumped into him. Now the point of that scene was supposed to chill you to the core and point out the complete lack or morality of the character. However, some of the guys viewed the scene as just "cool."
All films are subject to misuse.
You can watch Schindler's List for the nudity but you'd be missing the point.
Posted by: Tom Buller at Jan 18, 2006 4:10:15 PM
Both directors are guaranteed future projects. If Brokeback earned $32 million, all gravy- intended purely as Cultural Volley. Hostel was made to draw $30 M plus- in vanguard of horror movies intended for gross, violent scenes, not those in strange houses starring Kate Hudson or other actresses moving up the food chain. Brokeback is to Hostel as Hugh Hefner to Larry Flynt. One category maintains insufferable pretentions. The others are what they are.
Posted by: Gerard E. at Jan 18, 2006 4:14:01 PM
It is with great trepidation that I disagree with you Zhou; but, having been around my share of directors, I can tell you they are pretty weird and eccentric. Don't get me wrong, writers are nuts too, but directors are hardly exempt. :)
Posted by: Adolfo Rodriguez at Jan 18, 2006 4:19:46 PM
